Satellite Reception with a 19 Metre Dish

Size: px

Start display at page:

Download "Satellite Reception with a 19 Metre Dish"

Russell Lucas
5 years ago
Views:

STATION REPORT Earth Station Usingen, Germany Satellite Reception with a 19

Frankfurt In an age of ever decreasing antenna sizes and only very few

particular where TV channels are beamed up to a satellite: at satellite earth

One of Europe's top 5 stations is located close to the small town of Usingen,

1 STATION REPORT Earth Station Usingen, Germany Satellite Reception with a 19 Metre Dish 30 Years of Satellite Reception and Uplink in Usingen near Frankfurt In an age of ever decreasing antenna sizes and only very few satellite DXers using large dishes it's a welcome change to explore really huge antennas close-up. These can only be found in professional settings, of course, and in particular where TV channels are beamed up to a satellite: at satellite earth stations. One of Europe's top 5 stations is located close to the small town of Usingen, not far from Frankfurt in Germany. View of a section of the Usingen earth station, which boasts a total of 110 antennas. ë Usingen (Frankfurt) 108 TELE-satellite Global Digital TV Magazine 08-09/2010

Station manager Lothar Stöckmann (left) sums up the technical details of the Usingen earth station for Luo Shigang (right), technical editor of Chinese specialised magazine Satellite TV & Internet IP

2 Station manager Lothar Stöckmann (left) sums up the technical details of the Usingen earth station for Luo Shigang (right), technical editor of Chinese specialised magazine Satellite TV & Internet IP in the station s meeting room. TELE-satellite World Download this report in other languages from the Internet: Arabic العربية Indonesian Indonesia Bulgarian Български Czech Česky German Deutsch English English Spanish Español Farsi فارسي French Français Hebrew עברית Greek Ελληνικά Croatian Hrvatski Italian Italiano Hungarian Magyar Mandarin 中文 Dutch Nederlands Polish Polski Portuguese Português Romanian Română Russian Русский Swedish Svenska Turkish Türkçe Available online starting from 30 July /2010 TELE-satellite Global Digital TV Magazine 109

3 A total of 110 satellite antennas on an area of 1.2 million square metres are any DXer s pure delight! All this equipment is used commercially, though, and each single dish is assigned a specific task. Lothar Stöckmann is the manager of the Usingen earth station and tells us of how it all began. 80 years ago this area was being used as a field airstrip. The reason was that the surrounding mountains held back rain clouds and wind gusts with the effect that average rainfalls are much lower here than in Frankfurt, for example, Lothar Stöckmann highlights the peculiarities of that part of the world. Back then all electronic communication between Germany and the rest of the world was routed through Frankfurt and when data loads became more and more demanding and a new shortwave station Antenna no. 2 with a diameter of 19 metres. Earth station manager Lothar Stöckmann stands in front of the dish with his arms spread apart to demonstrate the sheer size of this antenna. was being planned in 1955 the Usingen region with its favourable weather conditions came to mind. Soon after, the former field airstrip was converted into a transmission station, because less rain invariably means less interference in shortwave and satellite transmissions. At the time, however, nobody talked about satellites. It was only on 1 February 1979 when our first 18.3 meter satellite antenna became operational, Lothar 110 TELE-satellite Global Digital TV Magazine 08-09/2010

Stöckmann remembers. In that day and age this was a sensational story, considering that in the whole of Europe only a handful of similar dishes were being operated.

It was more than two years later, on 14 July 1981, that the first antenna for satellite TV was commissioned.

Inside one of the huge antennas: hollow conductors are used to guide and switch satellite signals.

4 Stöckmann remembers. In that day and age this was a sensational story, considering that in the whole of Europe only a handful of similar dishes were being operated. At first we only performed tests for OTS. Mind you, however, we re not talking satellite TV but attempts to transmit digital data for voice communication. It was more than two years later, on 14 July 1981, that the first antenna for satellite TV was commissioned. It was used for INTELSAT V, Lothar Stöckmann states and adds our transmission only partly dealt with television, the remaining capacity was used for voice data. Inside one of the huge antennas: hollow conductors are used to guide and switch satellite signals. Things really got moving in 1984 when the first commercial TV stations from Germany were beamed up to the first TV-only satellite. Starting from 1 January 2000 the first digital DVB-S signals have been transmitted to satellites from Usingen. It was the German Post Office that initially founded the Usingen earth station. During the course of going private of public corporations in Germany the time had come also for the Usingen earth station of leaving behind state ownership. Today, Media Broadcast, a division of the leading European broadcast and media provider TDF, runs the earth station. TDF has a total workforce of more than 5000 employees, some 1150 of which work for German operating company Media Broadcast. Slide with a list of satellites from and to which signals can be transmitted from Usingen. Media Broadcast takes care of the technical transmissions of more than 850 German program providers. Added to that are 110 content providers from The Usingen earth station is a professional operation which means that failures of the public power grid must be compensated. Seen here is one of two diesel generators which are capable of providing enough power for all transmission components. Approximately once a year there is a real power failure (if a power line is cut during road works, for example) and in such a case the back-up systems starts automatically. About twice a year we experience scheduled power outages which are necessary for maintenance or repair of the grid, for instance, the responsible technician explains. Apart from that, we let the diesel generators run at capacity for a certain period of time every three months to make sure the engines stay operational at all times. Whenever this is done any excess power is even fed back into the public grid. We have enough diesel available to run our generators for four weeks in a row, the technician emphasises that the Usingen earth station is self-sufficient for prolonged periods. 112 TELE-satellite Global Digital TV Magazine 08-09/2010

5 abroad, such as American Forces TV for which Media Broadcast provides transmission technology. For Czech Television network CR the company uplinks all The battery room: all electric power drawn from the public grid runs through these batteries at all time. This in turn means that the batteries can take over immediate power supply in case of sudden power failure or outage. Think laptop computer: whenever you unplug the power cord from the mains, the internal battery pack takes over and provides power without interruption. Seen here is Holger Crump, press officer of Media Broadcast, next to rows of 200 batteries each. With a voltage of 2 V per single battery each row provides 400 V. With this huge amount of cells the Usingen earth station can be run for two hours without any external power supply. You might wonder why all this equipment is needed if the diesel generators are supposed to go on immediately anyway in case the power grid fails. The reason is not to avoid a single second of content not being transmitted, but rather to make sure all servers keep running. After one minute without power all servers are set back to zero, Lothar Stöckmann explains. And since virtually everything is server-based these days the cost of rebooting hundreds or even thousands of servers by far outstrips the cost of all these batteries. HDTV broascasts. Media Broadcast also provides technology for the in-house TV network of a major automaker. One of the more peculiar aspects of the company is that fact that it also operates the DVB-H network in Austria right from its Usingen location. Lothar Stöckmann lets us know how that comes about: Commercial TV channels are received here in Usingen, and in addition we receive additional channels from Austria via fibre-optic cable. We then bundle all channels into a single multiplex, reduce the data rate to DVB-H standard and send the complete package back to Austria via fibre-optic cable. In Austria these channels are transmitted via DVB-H countrywide to all service subscribers. This clearly demonstrates that the Usingen earth station is not only active in satellite transmissions but also right on track when it comes to implementing new technologies. Our control centre handles the complete IPTV offer of Deutsche Telekom as well, Lothar Stöckmann continues. Almost 200 TV channels are picked up here in part directly via satellite and also via dedicated data lines. We use these signals to create an IPTV signal which is then available all over Germany. The Usingen earth station is a forerunner when it comes to technical innovations, but even technology that is classified as a thing of the past by some still serves a very useful purpose. Lothar Stockmann gives us a brief run-up of an upcoming project: We will install another 11 metre antenna for the C band this year. This makes the Usingen earth station nothing short of a paradise with tried-and-tested satellite technology side by side with the latest digital innovations. Once you re here you ll never want to leave again! 114 TELE-satellite Global Digital TV Magazine 08-09/2010

Innovation Out of Thailand

COMPANY REPORT Dish Antenna Manufacturer INFOSAT, Thailand Innovation Out of Thailand Niran Tangpiroontham (left), INFOSAT s Chief, and Alexander Wiese (right), TELE-satellite s Editor-in-Chief, in front